What Did CNN Know, When Did It Know It?In Dissent, Number
One Hundred and Threeby Brian S. Wise15 April 2003

Exactly how did CNN become so cozy
with the regime in the first place, where secrets the magnitude of political
assassination can be offhandedly discussed?

Here
is Eason Jordan, chief news executive at CNN, explaining in part why CNN
ignored and failed to report various atrocities undertaken by the Hussein
regime: “Each time I visited [Baghdad], I became more distressed by what
I saw and heard – awful things that could not be reported because doing so
would have jeopardized the lives of Iraqis, particularly those on our Baghdad
staff.” How, pray tell? “Working for a foreign news organization
provided Iraqi citizens no protection.” From whatever would they need
to be protected? “The secret police terrorized Iraqis working for international
press services who were courageous enough to try to provide accurate reporting.
Some vanished, never to be heard from again. Others disappeared and
then surfaced later with whispered tales of being hauled off and tortured
in unimaginable ways. Obviously, other news organizations were in the
same bind we were when it came to reporting on their own workers.”

So the upshot is, CNN simply had to ignore Uday Hussein’s plans, as personally
explained to Eason Jordan, to not only assassinate King Hussein (of Jordan),
but to lure two of his brothers-in-law, who had defected, back into the country
and murder them, as well. Contends Jordan, “If we had gone with the
story, I was sure he [Uday] would have responded by killing the Iraqi translator
who was the only other participant in the meeting.” Such a humanitarian
gesture – in the end, the two brothers-in-law were lured back into Iraq and
summarily executed. But at least the CNN translator (something of actual
importance to the network) went unharmed, even if the ratio of dead innocents
to living innocents ended up being two to one. How many other innocent
Iraqis were killed in order to save CNN employees? No guidance is given,
but we are to assume the ratio is much, much greater than two to one.

More: “I came to know several Iraqi officials well enough that they confided
in me that Saddam Hussein was a maniac who had to be removed.” Did
Eason Jordan come to a similar conclusion? We are not directly told,
but we can assume this is a fact from the opening line, about how each visit
proved more disturbing than the last. That being the case, why did
CNN oppose the war? Why did CNN not simply employ an all American staff
while in Baghdad? (They may or may not have been allowed to do such
a thing by the regime, on this I admit my ignorance. But Fox
News managed to carry on with its coverage of Iraq just perfectly from border
countries; my point is not moot.) Exactly how did CNN become so cozy
with the regime in the first place, where secrets the magnitude of political
assassination can be offhandedly discussed?

Jordan concludes: “I felt awful having these stories bottled up inside me.
Now that Saddam Hussein's regime is gone, I suspect we will hear many, many
more gut-wrenching tales from Iraqis about the decades of torment. At last,
these stories can be told freely.” At least we can take comfort in
the fact Eason Jordan is unburdened, even if the living friends and families
of all those killed by the regime, some of whom may have even been saved
by CNN saying a word or two, will never be unburdened.

A reader directs my attention to an electronic mail read on the Rush Limbaugh
show last Friday; a quick visit to the site uncovers the thing, written by
a man named Howard. “This comes from an organization that will breathlessly
report on anything about the Bush administration that they perceive … to
have a hint of scandal: Cheney and the energy plan, Lott’s comments, the
Bush girls, ties to Enron …. So who is more responsible for the deaths of
more people? Enron, Global Crossing, Exxon, the timber industry, Newt
Gingrich, and all the other whipping boys of the left added together, or
CNN?” A fine point, and one to think about.

The CNN matter will not end with the satisfaction of executives being dragged
out of offices or penthouses in handcuffs (a.k.a. “The Perp Walk”), this
is a gigantic moral failing, not a legal one. But CNN would be well
served to remember that humanity’s first responsibility is to itself – to
explain it in a roundabout way, we fought the Iraqi War not only for the
Iraqi people, but for ours as well – and that concern for the victimized
can extend beyond damage done to a 401(k).